ishtry experiences

May 23, 2006

My MA exams are finally over. Over these past five days, i have written more lies than i have ever told in my life before. The height of "reel" came today when i was writing the answer for "estimate the career and achievements of jatavarman sundarapandian". Now all i know about the bloke in question is that MGR played him in "madurayai meetta sundarapandian" and lisped a lot of "kayaviyi", "kayaviyi" (MGRspeak for Kayalvizhi) in the movie. I filled two pages of A4 sheet with what i remembered of the MGR movie based on Akilan's novel (and most of it was surprisingly accurate, when i checked it out later)

The questions in all the five papers were highly subjective - mostly we were asked to comment on statements like "Aurangazeb dug his own grave in the deccan", or "Asoka had an able forerunner in Chandragupta Maurya" and things like that. This way of subjective questioning is good in the Masters level, but we have been specifically warned to write just the facts of what happened in that time and where and no justifications/pontifications please. But remembering all the datum is what is highly confusing - with multiple similar names and years (with multiple versions of chronology in some periods) it is a pain in the ass to remember all things everywhere.

I wish instead of these 3 hour bouts of intense mug-vomitting, there were more analysis assignments. I could do more with those, instead of writing 5 exams in 5 days. But hey, when one is doing one's Masters in a standard diploma mill open university, one cant be choosy.

===These are the five papers i wrote and my chances of clearing them :

1) History of North India till 643 AD. Bad, Bad, i knew nothing of north india except the samudragupta dude. Chances of passing this are same as those of an independent candidate retaining his vetti in A*ndipatt*i

2) History of Greater Mughals (1526-1707 AD) Now this is one of my favorites, I cant be more happier than when i am denouncing Aurangazeb as an idiot. verri vaippu pragasam might pull of a la captain in V*iruthachala*m

3) History of Modern India (1707 - 1857 AD) Had a spot of trouble with Wellesley. But there is a lot of mughal history in this period and aced the questions on it. Will pull through.

4)History of Europe (1789 - 1919 AD) Now this is the home ground. It is by reading pulpish historical novels called Roger Brook Series that i got hooked into history. Be it denouncing Von Mitternich or discussing Blood and Iron, everything was a home run.

5)South Indian History till 1336 AD. Now i should have been able to ace this easily. But the course load is double that of the other subjects. There are about half a dozen major dynasties at work here - satavahanas, pandyas, cholas, chalukyas (both kalyani and vatapi), hoysalas, yadavas, kakatiyas, gangas and pallavas. Throw in a little bit of Malik kafur, early vijayanagar history to confuse the poor me. Still i might make it.